At the end of World War II many German officers were held by the Allies and had to write about their activities in World War II. Greenhill have already published several volumes gathering together some of this important archive material, such as Fighting in Hell, The Anvil of War and The Luftwaffe Fighter Force. Now a new volume is to be published, edited by the distinguished American historian Bruce Gudmundsson. The new volume is: INSIDE THE AFRIKA KORPS The Crusader Battles, 1941–1942 and it is by Colonel Rainer Kriebel and the U.S. Army Intelligence Service. The German Afrika Korps was an outstanding military organisation that witnessed both the heights of glory and the depths of defeat in the Western Desert campaign. This new book presents the battles of the Afrika Korps as seen through the eyes of a trained general staff officer, and gives a key insight into a formidable fighting force at the height of its powers. Kriebel's debrief, here edited and placed in context by an acknowledged authority on the German armies of World War II, was recorded after the war as part of the American military historical programme. His account highlights the German response to the Crusader offensive and the brilliant series of actions that followed, and analyses the unparalleled genius and fatal flaws of Erwin Rommel's generalship. Inside the Afrika Korps is a key to understanding Rommel and the men he commanded, and exposes the secrets of this exemplary fighting force's success as well as the dangers inherent in victory. Bruce Gudmundsson is a well known and respected authority on the German Army of World War II, and the author of numerous books and articles. Colonel Rainer Karl-Theodore Kriebel, a native of Bavaria, joined the 21st Infantry Regiment of the inter-war German Army on 4th January 1926. At the outbreak of war in 1939, he found himself in the Foreign Armies (West) section of the Army General Staff in Berlin and was one of the handful of German officers who kept an eye on the French while the majority of their colleagues focused their efforts on the conquest of Poland. During the 1940 campaign in France, Kriebel was the General Staff liaison officer at Panzergruppe von Kleist and, as such, had the opportunity to view, at first hand, the action and mutual support of several armoured and motorised divisions. In October 1940, Captain Kriebel became the senior general staff officer (Ia) of the 15th Panzer Division. Promoted to Major in November of that year, Kriebel spent the winter of 1940–41 training his division, which had recently been converted from a muscle-powered infantry division, in the tactics of gasoline-powered warfare. In the spring of 1941, Major Kriebel went to North Africa, where he continued to serve as Ia of the 15th Panzer Division until March 1942, when he was transferred to the Russian Front. After fifteen months as Ia of the 2nd Panzer Division, Kriebel returned to Berlin to teach tactics at the Kriegsakademie. In May 1944, Kriebel, who had since been promoted to lieutenant-colonel, returned to the Russian Front and the end of the war found Kriebel in Bohemia as a full colonel who managed to avoid surrender until 11th June 1945. After the war, Colonel Kriebel settled in Munich and eased his transition to civilian life by writing, for pay, a number of studies for the U.S. Foreign Military Studies programme. Back to Greenhill Military Book News No. 94 Table of Contents Back to Greenhill Military Book News List of Issues Back to Master Magazine List © Copyright 1999 by Greenhill Books This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com